Features

Flashbulb memories

Flashbulb memories

GREY’S NOTES by Michael Grey Piping Today #64, 2013. It’s an uncomfortable truth that any sentence that starts with “One of my earliest memories…” will induce in any person — outside of maybe a Freudian psychoanalyst — a vacant stare, a droop of the eye lids and just enough open-mouthed […]

Tunes in the key of A-Mixolydian

Tunes in the key of A-Mixolydian

Theory Top-Up by Tim Cummings Piping Today #71, 2014. In the last issue of Piping Today, we took a close look at the key of D-Major.  That article was the first of what will be a series designed to supplement previous articles1 that painted broader pictures of multiple musical keys2.  […]

Two heads are better than one

Two heads are better than one

GREY’S NOTES by Michael Grey Piping Today #63, 2013. It’s said that every day we each make thousands of decisions. Starting from the moment we wake up: do we get out of our chariots or roll over? And then: if we decide we want to eat, what’s for brekkie, what […]

Who was the Earl of Antrim? – Part 2

Who was the Earl of Antrim? – Part 2

A discussion on the possible influence ofScottish and Irish ceòl mòr on each other By Frank Timoney And what of the strange testimony by Dennis Hempson? In 1792, the Belfast city fathers finally realised in probable grateful relief, that the ancient tradition of Irish harp playing was about to disappear […]

Who was the Earl of Antrim? – Part 1

Who was the Earl of Antrim? – Part 1

A discussion on the possible influence of Scottish and Irish ceòl mòr on each other By Frank Timoney Whenever I would ask this question of any of the playing greats, I seemed always to get the same reply that he was a Scottish MacDonald and that the piece was of […]

Bearskin hats and pristine spats

Bearskin hats and pristine spats

GREY’S NOTES by Michael Grey Piping Today #62, 2013. I was at lunch with a work friend the other day when the subject came up:  just how old is the general public’s idea of the stereotypical pipe band? You know, Scotland the Brave, Black Bear, Green Hills and yards and […]

Exploring Donald MacDonald’s ceòl mòr

Exploring Donald MacDonald’s ceòl mòr

• From the Autumn 1998 edition of Notes At the 1998 Donald MacDonald Cuach invitational competition at the Clan Donald Centre on Skye, Roddy MacLeod, piping director of The Piping Centre, was a spectator rather than, as in the past, a competitor. He took the opportunity to speak with Colonel […]

16 questions with Finlay Johnston

16 questions with Finlay Johnston

Bagpipe.news caught up with Finlay Johnston shortly after his second Glenfiddich win last weekend. 1. You travel quite a bit. Is there anything you can’t leave home without?My pipes, my phone and headphones and maybe some paracetamol for the hangovers. 2. What’s the strangest thing you’ve ever eaten?Bird saliva on […]

The pipe and drink

The pipe and drink

About 1955, Col. J.P. Grant of Rothiemurchus, then one of the most important and influential men in piping, wrote the following letter, presumably for the Piping Times, but apparently decided not to send it. Thanks to the late James Campbell, it was published in the Piping Times of September 1985. […]